Papers - Christian Theist In A Postmodern World - Page 2

Review of Divine Discourse by Nicholas Wolterstorff

In Divine Discourse, Wolterstorff offers a series of arguments to defend his major conclusion that God still speaks today through Scripture! In order to hear God speaking, however, Christians should reformulate the relation of the Bible and divine revelation. For him, the best way to comprehend the Bible is through divine discourse and not necessarily divine revelation. Let’s begin clarifying the phrase ‘propositional revelation’ Wolterstorff refers to frequently. In a nutshell, propositional revelation refers to a non-manifestational revelation. That is, God does not self-reveal himself to humanity through powerful acts but through communication. It was through propositional revelation that God …

Review of The Nature of Doctrine by George Lindbeck

Based on his view of religion as a linguistic community, George Lindbeck’s The Nature of Doctrine calls Christians to pay heed to the integration of the Christian faith and secular scientific resources for the benefit of Christian ecumenical relations. In order to accomplish this task, Lindbeck wants to defend and propose a middle way to understand doctrine, its function, and nature. For him, the current state of affairs is very negative in terms of how people perceive Christian doctrines and dogmas. Lindbeck argues that doctrine should be understood as a linguistic system with its symbols and rules. With this suggestion, …

Review of By the Renewing of Your Minds by Ellen Charry

In Ellen Charry’s book By the Renewing of Your Minds she reclaims the pastoral role of Christian doctrines, once part of the theologian’s basic instruction, in the formation and development of our Christian life. The process of a cultivation of Christian virtues needs to be strengthened with theological content and not only with habits or repetitive actions. This is a very insightful claim that shapes the whole book through its chapters. If used rightly, Christian doctrine is an excellent means to nurture and discern one’s personal life and our communal life. Christian theology — patristic, medieval, or modern — serves …

John Calvin’s two-fold notion of faith and the possibility of faith formation

The purpose of this study is exploring John Calvin’s two-fold notion of faith in the 1559 Institutes and its central implications for pastoral theology in the emerging Reformed tradition in order to reclaim a broader and contextualized understanding of pastoral care and its relation with faith formation. To that end, this paper will focus on the ways the emerging Reformed church of second mid-sixteenth century in Geneva applied the Calvinian notion of faith to pastoral theology. It also explores some applications of such an understanding, especially for the modern American-Dutch reformed church. In the Reformed faith Calvin’s two-fold notion of …

Should we read Herman Bavinck’s The Philosophy of Revelation as an apologetics of despair?

In dealing with arguments against the Christian faith in his book The Philosophy of Religion, Bavinck uses a series of argumentative strategies. One of these strategies is the apologetics of despair. This study tries to figure out whether this strategy tends to be observed in most essays of the book or its use is only circumstantial. Bavinck does not reject at once and for all the ideas that may be detrimental to the faith, but instead, he engages with them in order to discover if they can offer some truth worth noting. In this respect, in the three essays discussed …

Whistle while you work

I remember one of my challenging internships while in Seminary. How could I forget it? The workload was too much, something that led me to organize a volunteer group. Every week I needed to do a series of regular tasks, such as organizing and distributing printed material, writing projects, and the list goes on. After several weeks of hard work, it was difficult to bear the workload. The problem was not my busy schedule itself or the number of assigned tasks, but the large and complex process to complete those tasks. One single project could even take weeks before it …

Four ways the Western church misreads the Scriptures

Three years ago, I was invited to attend to a five-hundred-member Reformed congregation. Xavier (named changed for privacy), the seminarian who invited me, shared with me all the aspects he liked about this particular congregation: high liturgical and ceremonial, relevant preaching, and social-focused. In addition, the building was breath-taking. It had several Gothic style elements and beautiful colored stained-glass windows. Thirty minutes after the start of the morning worship service, the minister started his sermon by asserting that the Bible is responsible of promoting old moral behaviors. It had led people to discriminate against each other so that the most …

Big on Newbigin

In a workshop I attended a couple of years ago, the speaker asked his audience some questions about Christian leadership. After participants answered with a variety of interesting responses, the speaker offered his definition of a leader. Without entering into details, I found myself struggling with this speaker’s definition of a Christian leader: everything he said reminded me of a corporate boss. I have to accept that at the end, a boss is kind of a leader. What I cannot accept, however, is that this kind of leadership is how Scripture depicts an “after God’s own heart” leader. Unlike other …

Panentheistic elements in Wolfhart Pannenberg’s notion of God

This paper will focus on the panentheistic elements found in Wolfhart Pannenberg’s Systematic Theology Vol.1 based on section 6.4 “God’s Spirituality, Knowledge, and Will” and section 6.5 “The Concept of Divine Action and the Structure of the Doctrine of the Divine Attributes” respectively. In his exposition, Pannenberg dialectically explores the possibility of a redefinition of the notion of God and rejects the anthropomorphic analogies and the Greek understanding of God as nous in order to emphasize the idea of God as Spirit and thus facilitate the intersection between the natural sciences and Christian theology. Thus, based on the Hebrew notion …

Reimaging Gideon’s leadership in light of Max Weber’s sociology of authority

Despite the methodological usefulness of some recent scholarship, Max Weber’s sociology of authority may still prove fruitful for biblical and leadership studies. This paper explores Gideon’s judgeship from such a perspective in order to broaden our understanding of the Gideon narrative as depicted in Judges 6-8 and reclaim Gideon’s portrayal as a competent and strong leader in spite of his initial state of hesitation and faith struggle. Notwithstanding the methodological usefulness of some of the more recent scholarship, Weber’s sociology of authority may still prove fruitful for biblical studies or leadership studies. By engaging Gideon’s narrative using Weber’s sociology of …

Review of Embracing the Body by Tara Owens

Embracing the Body: Finding God in Our Flesh and Bone by Tara M. Owens. Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2015. Pp. 254 pages. $17.00 softcover In her book, Embracing the Body: Finding God in Our Flesh and Bone, spiritual director Tara M. Owens deliberately focuses on the recovery of understanding the human being holistically in a culture that has traditionally seen the human body as negative and dangerous. Intended for a general readership, Embracing the Body is written in a simple and conversational style, yet provides a beautiful and thoughtful narrative. Overall, this book of thirteen chapters o ers readers both practical …

Review of Spiritual Guidance across Religions by John Mabry

Spiritual Guidance Across Religions: A Source for Spiritual Directors and Other Professionals Providing Counsel to People of Differing Faith Traditions by John R. Mabry, ed. Woodstock, VT: SkyLight Patch Publishing, 2014. Pp. 384 pages. $55.00 hardcover Let us begin with the following statement: Spiritual guidance is contextual. Often neglected in American culture, context in therapy, counseling, and spiritual care and direction is, nevertheless, of central importance. Paying much closer heed to the religious aspect in the context of pastoral care and direction, John R. Mabry has made a significant contribution to the field of spiritual guidance by editing the current …